Biomass | Tallahassee Renewable Energy Center

Florida’s first biomass power plant is currently in the early development stages with the state’s Department of Environment and Protection waiting on answers to its questions from the project’s developers, Biomass Gas & Electric LLC.

The biomass power plant, which will be called the Tallahassee Renewable Energy Center, will be capable of producing up to 42 MW of electricity. All of this electricity will be bought by the city of Tallahassee.

To produce this level of electricity, the company will require wood chips delivered to the plant in numbers of around 100 rail cars per week. The wood chips will be heated until they are turned into a gas which will then be burned to produce electricity. The process is said to be low pollutant because the wood chips aren’t burnt but are super-heated without using oxygen.

However, part of the application made by Biomass Gas & Electric makes provision for the plant to burn a small percentage of municipal solid waste such as yard trimmings.

Currently, however, the city of Tallahassee have extended the deadline for which BG&E have to get their state permit by 6 months. This means they have until December to answer the various questions.

Given that the permits are granted by December 2008, the expected completion date of construction and power production commencement is some time in 2010.